Rainy City | Weekly Photo #73
Here’s a familiar view of London, grey, dull and pouring with rain. For some, it’s a cue to get indoors to keep dry but for crazy people like me, I think it’s a great time to be wandering the streets with the camera, seeking out some creative photo opportunities.
Fujifilm XT2 | XF23mm F2 | 23mm | 1/250th Second | f/2.8 | ISO200
Before I head out with the camera, I tend to check the forecast so I‘m prepared for weather like this but as they say, you can’t predict the weather and nor it seems could any of my weather apps, as on this particular afternoon, there was no rain forecast, so I wasn’t exactly dressed for the occasion. Although I was lacking a raincoat, the good news was that I had my weather-resistant Fujifilm XT2 and XF23mm lens with me so even though I was going to get wet, my camera would keep on shooting without me having to worry about rain affecting the gear. So, with the rain falling, I set off towards the city to capture a few shots.
I spotted this view as I wandered towards London’s Bank station and although I was already familiar with the composition, the rain-soaked road added an opportunity to be creative and play around with some reflections. As I worked to refine the composition, I had great fun jumping in and out of the road to avoid the busses so it took a few tries and although I was soaked through, I got the shot I was after.
My aim was to use the huge 22 Bishopsgate building as the main focal point and place it on the left hand third. I also wanted to introduce some colour by using the London bus on the right and at the same time, keep the camera close to the ground so that the reflections were prominent in the foreground. As it was quite dark, I was shooting wide open which enabled me to keep the shutter speed up at 1/250th second and keep the ISO down at 200. Keeping the ISO low helped keep the shot clean of too much noise and the wider aperture and shallower depth of field helped keep the raindrops visible in the foreground but soft enough so they didn’t appear too distracting.
Back in Lightroom. I opened up the shadows just a bit on the right-hand side to brighten up the red bus so it stood out a little more. I also introduced some contrast in the foreground to emphasise those reflections and finished off with some tones and grading adjustments.
In between chasing some autumn landscape photos closer to home, I’m back in London for an evening shoot tomorrow so looking forward to seeing what shots I can come away with.
I’ll talk to you next week.
Trevor
This post is featured in my Weekly Photo series where I post a new photo every Monday. To have this delivered directly to your inbox, you can subscribe to the mailing list here.